[POLL] United States Presidential Elections 2016

The party nominees are named. Now who do you support?


  • Total voters
    278
  • Poll closed .
Status
Not open for further replies.
Something mildly amusing to take things off the edge: Donald Trump bought the domain names jebbush.com and hillaryclinton.net. I was not aware of this until today.

Go on, try them. You'll be horrified.
 
Something mildly amusing to take things off the edge: Donald Trump bought the domain names jebbush.com and hillaryclinton.net. I was not aware of this until today.

Go on, try them. You'll be horrified.

Wow, just wow. We've come to an all new time low.
 
This is a key insight. Many would agree high corporate taxation is among the reasons US jobs have been transferred abroad. But what Trump significantly adds is deportation of illegals, the Great Wall, and much more aggressive deal-making with respect to foreign trade arrangements. Trump boldly proposes putting the interests of US citizens distinctly ahead of the interests of the remainder of the world's peoples. This is the essence of nationalism and the populist fervor that he has inspired amongst a broad spectrum of Americans.

With the prospect of a 20 trillion dollar debt bubble collapsing over the US (not to mention the global debt bubble), you are probably right that it is a fantasy that well-paying jobs will ever again be widely available to middle and lower class US citizens. That is, unless Trump - or another like him - is elected and fulfills his promises.

You are correct in saying that what Trump promises is to put the interests of American citizens ahead of the remainder of the world's peoples. This is in direct contrast to traditional GOP politicians who have basically promoted the corporate agenda on the theory that what's good for business is good for the American people. It's also in contrast to the libertarian perspective put forward by Danoff that :

The rest will naturally follow (as it has for a rather long time now).

It may be true that the rest will naturally follow, but in a global economy, in which the many competitive advantages that the US enjoyed over the last two centuries have more or less disappeared, what that rest may be, is the continued erosion of the standard of living of the American working classes & middles classes. From a global perspective this may be a perfectly reasonable outcome, but from the perspective of a US politician seeking office it isn't. GOP politicians offer the same old trickle-down ideas, whereas Trump hints at protectionist measures. Even supposing that protectionism (& a wall) would actually improve the situation of American workers in the long run, which is highly questionable, there's little prospect that a President Trump could actually successfully renegotiate trade deals with the other international players, or even, domestically, persuade a majority within Congress, where he would be opposed by both Republicans & Democrats, to back protectionist measures.
 
Dollar for dollar, robots cost less to maintain than the average worker, I mean take a look at the automotive industry today compared to 50 years ago. Today it is manned with robots thanks to the unions whereas humans manned the assembly line back then. The food industry will suffer the same fate before too long if the push for unionization keeps up.

There's been huge strides in robotic and automation technology in the past 25 years, let alone in the past 50 years. Technological strides that have allowed automation to be used in situations that you wouldn't even imagine 50 years ago.

There isn't just one sole reason driving the march towards automation in manufacturing. There are reasons to automate, and reasons to not automate. One reason may be safety; you don't want your workers getting hurt on the job repetitively doing work that's high stress on the body. One reason may be from the demand for goods or technologies that require a level of precision that a human cannot build to. Another reason may be automation is more efficient. And finally, if the cost of a worker is greater than automation, that may tip the scales towards automating.

With that said, automation isn't "free". It costs money to buy and set up all the equipment, engineering hours to design the production system in which the automation will work, running and maintenance cost of machines, and cost of people to run, oversee, and support the machine.

Cost is a component of the whole equation to automate or not automate, but not the only, nor is it even necessarily the primary reason. It has to be the right automation at the right place at the right time capable of doing the right job at the right cost.
 
the many competitive advantages that the US enjoyed over the last two centuries have more or less disappeared, what that rest may be, is the continued erosion of the standard of living of the American working classes & middles classes.

So nebulous. I could ask you to back that up but I'm sure you could find some cooked numbers to support these statements. Standard of living is such a difficult thing to pin down. What's even harder is to pin down the driving factors of changes in the standard of living.

The US is a socialist country by many measures. We have socialist policies, outspoken socialist goals, and now we even have a popular candidate who basically admits to being a socialist. We even have socialist problems (crushing national debt). So when we talk about competitive advantages disappearing or an erosion of the standard of living, we have to keep in mind that we've been a socialist nation for quite some time (I'm going with at least a decade).

There are two main reasons why a Chinese worker might be preferable to a US worker. One is because the US worker enjoys a higher standard of living and refuses to live on as little pay as the Chinese worker. The other is that the US worker comes with the burden of the US government. To the extent that we outsource for the first reason, that's progress. To the extent that we outsource for the second reason, that's failure. That might seem like an over-simplification, but sending money out and getting more goods and services in return (trade deficit) is deflationary, and that's a forcing function that increases standard of living.
 
It's soo obvious Trump is an Athiest, he might fool the Evangelicals but Im not falling for it(He knows this is a must to stand a chance as a republican).
 
He replied back... can't find a source but just saw it on Faux

On his website;

Big Trump's Official Opening
If and when the Vatican is attacked by ISIS, which as everyone knows is ISIS’s ultimate trophy, I can promise you that the Pope would have only wished and prayed that Donald Trump would have been President because this would not have happened. ISIS would have been eradicated unlike what is happening now with our all talk, no action politicians.

The Mexican government and its leadership has made many disparaging remarks about me to the Pope, because they want to continue to rip off the United States, both on trade and at the border, and they understand I am totally wise to them. The Pope only heard one side of the story - he didn’t see the crime, the drug trafficking and the negative economic impact the current policies have on the United States. He doesn’t see how Mexican leadership is outsmarting President Obama and our leadership in every aspect of negotiation.

For a religious leader to question a person’s faith is disgraceful. I am proud to be a Christian and as President I will not allow Christianity to be consistently attacked and weakened, unlike what is happening now, with our current President. No leader, especially a religious leader, should have the right to question another man’s religion or faith. They are using the Pope as a pawn and they should be ashamed of themselves for doing so, especially when so many lives are involved and when illegal immigration is so rampant.
 
So it's all a conspiracy by the Mexicans to put Mexican interests ahead of American interests, then? How is that any different to Trump putting American interests ahead of everyone else? He can't complain when someone does exactly what he did.
 
So it's all a conspiracy by the Mexicans to put Mexican interests ahead of American interests, then? How is that any different to Trump putting American interests ahead of everyone else? He can't complain when someone does exactly what he did.
Trump's constituents are US voters. The Pope's constituents are the world's Catholics.
go.php

The walled city state of the Vatican
 
Given the fact that the United States and most of the world are in a recession where is the talk from either parties on either monetary or fiscal policy? Sadly I don't expect for there to be none given that both parties not only want to tax the hell out of americans with their massive spending but also love a Federal Reserve that continue to distort and destroy the economy.

On another note, Rubio is the biggest idiot of them all. Why? This buffoon claims he wants to cut taxes but at the same time want to increase spending on the military. Somebody should tell clueless idiot any form of spending is an tax incrase not a tax cut. If anything Rubio is no different in being fiscally irresponsible then former president(and the clueless one currently in office)
 
Small, malleable and pretty, Rubio is the darling of the establishment. Put your money on him.
 
On another note, Rubio is the biggest idiot of them all. Why? This buffoon claims he wants to cut taxes but at the same time want to increase spending on the military. Somebody should tell clueless idiot any form of spending is an tax incrase not a tax cut. If anything Rubio is no different in being fiscally irresponsible then former president(and the clueless one currently in office)
Not if you are cutting discretionary social services in the process like Obamacare. Sure it won't sit well with some voters, but they are primarily in favor of large tax increases for expanded social spending regardless.
 
Not if you are cutting discretionary social services in the process like Obamacare. Sure it won't sit well with some voters, but they are primarily in favor of large tax increases for expanded social spending regardless.

Glad you brought up Obamacare(which nothing but a mutation of what Nixion did with healthcare and LBJ's failed Great Society socialist programs) but speaking of Republicans I hate it when they say they want to repeal and replace. Now I'm all for repeal but replace is stupid..What the GOP should call for is a complete legalization of free market healthcare i.e getting government out of healthcare completely business and shut down the FDA in the process.
 
I honestly believe that Obama made his care plan to fail, in order to get rid of the crocked scam of insurance companies and the like. It's going to sting like a bee and I'd rather see it repealed.

As far as fiscal policies are concerned, don't we look toward our house?
 
Not if you are cutting discretionary social services in the process like Obamacare. Sure it won't sit well with some voters, but they are primarily in favor of large tax increases for expanded social spending regardless.

Kanye's 2020 credentials suddenly seem more and more robust.

EDIT: I actually meant to quote Touring Mars... don't know how that happened :D


Trump does believe in God.. unfortunately he thinks it's him.
 
Last edited:
So nebulous. I could ask you to back that up but I'm sure you could find some cooked numbers to support these statements. Standard of living is such a difficult thing to pin down. What's even harder is to pin down the driving factors of changes in the standard of living.

Well the driving factors would be: an historically unprecedented population growth rate in the US from about 3 million in the late 1700's to over 300 million in the late 1900's, & access to almost unlimited (by European standards) "unoccupied" land & vast natural resources, together with an unprecedented explosion in technological innovation - these combined to create a massive increase in living standards across a broad spectrum of American society.

Those circumstances & the resulting growth in wealth is unlikely ever to happen again in human history, certainly not in the US & certainly not in your lifetime. Nothing any US politician says or does - not Trump, or Cruz, or Bush, or Clinton or Sanders - will bring back anything like those growth rates in the future.

From the 1950's to around 1980 the growth in wealth in the US (& Europe) was fairly widely distributed, due to the introduction of "socialist" policies & aggressively progressive taxation. Since the beginning of the 1980's - with the introduction of "trickle down" economics - wealth in the US has become more & more concentrated in the hands of a very small percentage of the population. The globalization of the economy has facilitated this, as it has allowed the capitalist class to move production out of the US in order to maximize profits.

It's really not that nebulous - & the numbers don't have to be "cooked" - they're pretty indisputable. What you make of them is another matter.
 
Kanye's 2020 credentials suddenly seem more and more robust.

Kanye wouldn't have ever let the aftermath from Katarina happen in New Orleans due to lack of care from FEMA and Bush deployment of them. I mean see for yourself, even Mike Myers shows concern...

 
Well the driving factors would be: an historically unprecedented population growth rate in the US from about 3 million in the late 1700's to over 300 million in the late 1900's, & access to almost unlimited (by European standards) "unoccupied" land & vast natural resources, together with an unprecedented explosion in technological innovation - these combined to create a massive increase in living standards across a broad spectrum of American society.

Those circumstances & the resulting growth in wealth is unlikely ever to happen again in human history, certainly not in the US & certainly not in your lifetime. Nothing any US politician says or does - not Trump, or Cruz, or Bush, or Clinton or Sanders - will bring back anything like those growth rates in the future.

From the 1950's to around 1980 the growth in wealth in the US (& Europe) was fairly widely distributed, due to the introduction of "socialist" policies & aggressively progressive taxation. Since the beginning of the 1980's - with the introduction of "trickle down" economics - wealth in the US has become more & more concentrated in the hands of a very small percentage of the population. The globalization of the economy has facilitated this, as it has allowed the capitalist class to move production out of the US in order to maximize profits.

It's really not that nebulous - & the numbers don't have to be "cooked" - they're pretty indisputable. What you make of them is another matter.

What numbers? I bolded the important part.

I'm not at all concerned about the "distribution" of wealth, and neither should anyone else be. The only reason one might concern themselves with that is if one were under the mistaken impression that there was a limited amount of wealth to go around - that one person's wealth affected another's. But of course anyone with a passing understanding of economics would realize immediately that that's a silly proposal.

Your post strongly implies that wealth comes from a gobbling of natural resources - almost as though whoever got to those resources first would be the wealthy person. It implies two incorrect things about economics. First - that wealth is limited. Wealth, unlike natural resources, is not limited. Second - that wealth is not earned, that it is instead taken (from nature). Wealth is created (earned) from nothing - which means it's earned and not limited. I'm sure you didn't mean to imply any of that because you understand economics.
 
I sure am glad Ted Cruz is around. Without him I wouldn't have ever known that a slightly left leaning Supreme Court has the judicial power to allow UNLIMITED ABORTIONS.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back